“Devlin, this is Lieutenant Rawlins of the Savannah Police Department.”
“Yes?”
“I just got a call from one of my officers, Detective Black. They found your wife.”
His heart thundered in his chest. Stella had been found. Alive?
Time vaulted to a standstill. For the past year, he’d searched endlessly. Even as a suspect himself, he’d pushed the cops and feds for the truth. They thought he’d crossed the line on this one.
But Luke Devlin never crossed the line. Not for anyone. Just as he didn’t believe that J.T. had been corrupt, either.
Eventually clues had turned up that made them believe Stella had left of her own accord. That she was alive and well, moving from one place to another. That she didn’t want to be reunited with him or to be found. But her disappearance had stamped a black mark on his career. Too many questions left unanswered. Too much doubt and suspicion for anyone to completely trust him.
Especially after all the trouble with J.T.
Although the police had officially deemed his partner’s death a suicide, and had called off the search for Stella, Luke hadn’t given up.
He had to solve the mystery around J.T.’s death. He’d been undercover at CIRP, getting close to finding out their latest experiments when he’d died. Luke needed to know what had happened to his wife on their honeymoon.
“Devlin?”
Luke cleared his throat, collecting himself. “Where is she?”
“Sunset Motel.”
“What?” His hand tightened around the phone. Was this some kind of joke? “What’s going on?”
“You can meet Detective Adam Black when you get there,” Lieutenant Rawlins said.
The officer started to hang up, but Luke needed more information. “Wait. Just tell me—is she … alive?”
A long hesitation stretched over the line, riddled with tension. Heat from the open window brushed his neck, and he broke out in a cold sweat.
“Yes, but, Devlin, there’s something else you need to know.” Rawlins paused, the scent of death and fear filled Luke again.
“What?”
“She’s going to be charged with murder.”
The breath whooshed from Luke’s chest. Moving on instincts so natural, he didn’t contemplate his actions, he closed the phone, yanked on his jeans, grabbed a shirt and jogged to his car. His mind raced while he cut through the streets of Savannah. Though it was midnight, tourists crowded the streets, Saturday night partiers in full swing. Booze and music floated through the humid summer air from River Street, a cruise ship had docked in town creating more chaos in the summer atmosphere. The roar of a siren in the distance reminded him that crimes had been at an all-time-high for the area, the closing of the bizarre suicide cases a while back having added more hype to the mysterious happenings at Nighthawk Island.
Questions rattled through his head, the same ones that had haunted him the past year. Where had Stella been all this time? Why had she left him on their wedding night? Had their marriage been some kind of scam? Had she been ill and decided not to burden him? Had she decided that she couldn’t stay married to him, that he was some kind of cold, FBI agent who didn’t know how to treat a wife? Or had she been in some kind of trouble, something she was afraid to confess to him?
But if she’d left of her own free will, why had there been blood on her wedding dress? That one element had bothered him, kept him searching for her, kept him awake each night with disturbing dreams and images.
And if she had been in trouble, why hadn’t she attempted to contact him sometime during the last year?
He maneuvered around traffic and a handful of pedestrians leaving a blues bar, then sped onto the road leading to the motel, leaving the historic side of Savannah with its town squares, haunted cemeteries and classy bed-and-breakfasts behind. He continued on, threading his way to the outskirts, to a rinky-dink motel that catered to low-rent patrons and truckers, ones who didn’t mind bug-infested rooms and two-bit hookers.
What was Stella doing at a place of this caliber? And why had Rawlins said they were going to arrest her for murder? Had she been held captive? Had she become involved with another man and gotten in over her head?
He approached the motel room with a mixture of trepidation and excitement. Finally he’d glean some answers. Learn the truth. Get closure.
Look into her eyes and know why she’d put him through hell the last year. Why she hadn’t loved him enough to stay around.
The blue lights of the Savannah police car swirled through the darkness, the neon lights of the Sunset Motel blinking as he parked. One letter was missing in the word Sunset so it read the Sunet, and the building was so dilapidated it should have been condemned. A smattering of rattletrap cars filled the lot, a group of spectators already hovered in the parking lot, smoking cigarettes and mumbling, obviously aware their peaceful night had been interrupted by crime.
He barreled his sedan into a parking spot, killed the engine, then grabbed his badge and flashed it at the locals working to secure the scene.
“Special Agent Devlin.”
The squatty officer at the bottom of the steps spoke first. “Detective Black said you’d be here.”
Luke nodded, grimacing. The man obviously knew about his past. As Luke climbed the steps to the second floor, he dodged a reporter and cameraman. The motel rooms were lined up, each with its own outdoor access to the balcony. The doors were painted an avocado-green that had faded to a pea-green color from the blistering sun and relentless summer heat.
Seconds later, he stopped at the doorway, his gaze skimming past the security guard talking to one of the local cops. Through the open doorway, he cataloged details of the scene.
Blood was splattered everywhere, soaking the sheets and dotting the stained gray carpet. The foul odors of death hit him. The mumblings of policemen at work. A crime scene crew that had just arrived.
He saw Detective Black inside, then his gaze landed on Stella, and his heart literally seemed to stop beating.
She sat stone-stiff in one of the motel chairs, her hands knotted, her normally olive complexion a pasty-white, while Black questioned her. Luke hadn’t imagined the gut-wrenching reality of seeing her alive, in the flesh.
The hair that had been buttery-blond was now jet-black, not short and layered as when he’d known her, but a long tangle of ebony waves that sent a bolt of surprise through him. Surprise and sexual desire. He had wanted Stella the first moment he’d met her. The moment he’d looked into her pale green eyes.
She’d been leaning against a bar wearing a red dress that hugged her curves and a pair of rhinestone earrings that had dangled down to her shoulders. Although surrounded by gaping men, she’d appeared disinterested. Instead she’d looked lost and lonely.
After the death of his partner and the questions surrounding J.T.’s final days, Luke had been vulnerable himself. He’d always admired the way Osborne had juggled his career and a wife, and for the first time in his life, Luke had wanted the same.
In an uncharacteristic move, he’d bought Stella a drink. Three vodka martinis later, and they’d crawled into bed for some of the steamiest sex in his life. Stella had completely poleaxed him with her odd mixture of shy vulnerability and her bold lack of inhibitions about her body.
A month later, they’d eloped and that blissful month of premarriage heaven had turned into the year from hell.
He cleared this throat, struggled for calm and entered the room. An eerie quiet descended as if the black cloud that had been following him had swallowed